July 5, 2018 — Preschool teacher Hannah Hendrickson said there are two distinct duties for catch samplers working at salmon processing plants around Bristol Bay.
“People oftentimes nickname this job as the pickers and the lickers, so I said, ‘I’m not a licker. I’m only a picker!’ ” she said.
The licker is her colleague Deven Lisac. Across the table at Peter Pan Seafoods in Dillingham, Lisac was snipping off bits of fins and plucking out fish scales. Saliva’s a good enough adhesive to stick fish scales on the thick cards for their journey to the Department of Fish and Game laboratory in King Salmon.
“Grab the tweezers, and then you just give it a lick,” Lisac advised. “And that was fish No. 4, so it goes on slot four.”
The pair are part of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s seasonal crew tasked with sampling 240 sockeye a day from each district in the bay. They also sample 200 chums and 200 kings a week.
July 5, 2018 — A US border patrol boat strayed into Canadian territorial waters while chasing “illegal immigrants” off the coast of Maine and Nova Scotia, Canadian fishermen said Wednesday.
Laurence Cook, chair of the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association, said on Facebook that a US border patrol launch out of Maine attempted to stop a Canadian fishing vessel in Canadian waters.
Grand Manan is a Canadian island in the Gulf of Maine, right off the coast that hosts the border between the United States and Canada.
Cook said the incident took place on June 24 near Machias Seal Island, a tiny and rocky outcrop a dozen miles (kilometers) south of Grand Manan with rich lobster grounds, and whose sovereignty is disputed by Washington, although the Canadian Coast Guard maintains a lighthouse there.
According to Cook, the Canadian fishing captain, Nick Brown, informed the US vessel that “he was a Canadian vessel legally fishing in Canadian waters.”
“Typical American bullies,” said Cook, who said he was “not surprised to see the Americans trying to push people around.”
Ties between Canada and the United States have been strained since President Donald Trump slapped tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, citing US national security, with Trump calling Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “very dishonest” and “weak” after a spat at the G7 meeting in Quebec last month.
Read the full story from the Agence France-Presse at Yahoo.com
July 5, 2018 — Rep. Don Young is trying again to renew the Magnuson-Stevens Act.
The nation’s fundamental federal fisheries law hasn’t been reauthorized since 2006. Young’s bill would allow more flexibility for regional fisheries management councils, but for villages near the mouth of the Kuskokwim River it is notable for what’s not included.
Since the 1990s, towns and villages along the western Alaska coast, from Norton Sound to the Aleutians, have had a stake in the lucrative Bering Sea fisheries, through the Community Development Quota program. The communities, divided into six CDQ groups, are allocated a portion of the fishing quota, which they can fish themselves or lease to the fishing industry.
By most measures, the program has been a success. In total, the six CDQ groups have amassed more than a billion dollars in cash and assets. The larger groups spend more than $30 million a year to help their regions, with service programs, job training, scholarships and local employment.
But the largest group, called Coastal Villages Region Fund, says it’s getting a raw deal. The group is known as CVRF and serves the Kuskokwim Delta, including villages from Scammon Bay to Platinum. More than 9,000 people live in that area, amounting to 35 percent of the total CDQ beneficiary population. However, they say they are allocated just 15 percent of the fish in the CDQ program.
Art Severance, corporate counsel for CVRF, said other groups have far fewer people and get the same or even more fish.
July 3, 2018 — China is slated to impose a 25 percent tariff on U.S. seafood — including Alaska’s — by the end of this week, as part of increasingly heated trade negotiations between the two nations.
According to a recent report by the McDowell Group, seafood is Alaska’s second largest employer — with 41,200 jobs created by the $2.1 billion industry. China is the state’s largest trading partner.
“This is worrisome, we’ll work this through with the administration,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski said of the sanctions, set to take effect on Friday, July 6.
Murkowski was in Anchorage Monday with U.S. Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta, as part of his tour around the state.
While worried about seafood, Murkowski said she is encouraged that China isn’t going after natural gas. In April, Gov. Bill Walker’s administration hoped the state’s potential partnership with China on a natural gas pipeline project could protect the state in a national trade war. But this latest threat to seafood indicates that may not be the case.
“It does raise a question about how they view what Alaska has available in terms of trade,” Murkowski said.
While in Alaska this weekend, Acosta visited a fishery in King Salmon.
July 2, 2018 — Gov. Bill Walker and Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott on Friday asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to suspend the environmental review process for the proposed Pebble mine project, citing the “unique” environment of the Bristol Bay region.
Pebble Limited Partnership has proposed the copper and gold prospect for a site that straddles the Bristol Bay salmon fishery headwaters.
Bristol Bay is the largest sockeye salmon fishery in the world. Without at least a preliminary economic assessment, Walker and Mallott said in the letter, the Army Corps would be “unable to take a hard look at all reasonable alternatives” in the draft environmental review.
“Given the unique characteristics of the region, the mine proposed by Pebble Limited Partnership (PLP) must be held to an extraordinarily high standard,” the letter said.
There are “too many unanswered questions” for the review to advance further, a statement from the governor’s office said Saturday afternoon.
July 2, 2018 — Gov. Bill Walker wants to press pause on the controversial Pebble Mine project in Southwest, Alaska. Pebble is seeking federal permits on a smaller mine proposal, about half the size of the one it began pursuing more than a decade ago.
But in a letter to the Army Corps of Engineers on Friday, Walker urged suspension of a critical piece of that process — the environmental impact statement — calling for proof of a “feasible and realistic” project first.
“This is something that we’ve looked at very carefully, and we feel like even the project proponents are unsure of the size of this project,” said Andy Mack, Commissioner of the Alaska Dept. of Natural Resources. “It’s impossible at this point I think for an agency, we believe to really credibly understand what’s going on when just a month ago, the size of the project was actually changed. And it was made larger within the parameters of the scoping period which is designed to start talking about what the parameters of a project might be.”
Mack said the project would have to prove “zero impact” on the Bristol Bay Watershed in order to earn the administration’s support. The region is home to the most valuable wild salmon fishery in the world.
July 2, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — A National Marine Fisheries Service internal document sent to the Kodiak Island Borough on Monday details preliminary estimates for regional allocation of the federal relief funding for the 2016 pink salmon disaster. According to the document, of the $56 million in relief funding that was allocated to the Gulf of Alaska for those affected by the 2016 pink salmon disaster, $11,477,873 might be set aside for Kodiak.
NOAA spokesperson Julie Speegle said that the numbers in the document are simply an estimate and are not set in stone.
“The $56.3 million allocation across all impacted fishing districts and gear types has not been determined. That is being worked on over the next month by PSMFC in consultation with the State of Alaska and NOAA,” Speegle wrote in an email. “Finalization occurs when the spend plan has been completed and the grant award has been approved.”
According to Speegle, the estimate of the regional allocations is based on preliminary ex-vessel losses to commercial pink salmon harvesters in 2016 and it is “difficult to predict” the likelihood of final allocation.
With regards to the rest of the $56 million, preliminary estimates for regional allocation are as follows: Southeastern – $10,030,734; Yakutat – $46,712; Lower Cook Inlet – $310,352; Prince William Sound – $32,200,363; South Alaska Peninsula – $1,752,664; Chignik – $542,635.
Another $63 million will be allocated among seven other regions for various fishery disasters in Washington and California.
At a recent Kodiak Fisheries Workgroup meeting, the City of Kodiak and the Kodiak Island Borough’s D.C. lobbyist Brad Gilman explained that NMFS and the office of the Governor have to come to a spend plan that identifies the categories of entities which could receive funding and then quantifies how much each of the categories receive within the
available funds. Gilman said that once approved, the Pacific State Marine Fisheries Commission (the entity charged with administering the funds) will likely “start cutting checks immediately.”
A spokesperson for PSMFC said that a distribution method is still pending.
“We were notified that we’ll be administering the funds,” the spokesperson said. “Currently, we don’t have a distribution method figured out.”
Rep. Louise Stutes (R-Kodiak) once again expressed her delight that Kodiak will be receiving some relief funding. Stutes said she’s been pressing the governor’s office to ensure that the funds are distributed, not just to fishermen, but to all of those who were affected.
“I want to make sure that our processor workers receive some of those dollars,” she said.
This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.
June 29, 2018 — Early in the season for most Alaska salmon fisheries, commercial harvest numbers are well below where they were at the same time in 2017, according to data put out on Thursday by Anchorage consulting firm the McDowell Group and the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute.
The sockeye harvest was 64 percent lower this year through June 23 than it was through the same time frame last year, according to the McDowell Group. The harvest of king salmon was 49 percent lower, as expected, and the pink salmon harvest was down 67 percent. Chum salmon harvest numbers were up 5 percent.
Slow sockeye harvests in Prince William Sound, Kodiak and Chignik are a main reason for the lagging numbers, McDowell Group economist Garrett Evridge said in an email.
Still, he cautioned, it’s early in the season and a couple good weeks of fishing can significantly change the harvest trajectory for many areas. A good week in Bristol Bay alone can double the statewide harvest, Evridge added.
“We’re still in the early weeks,” he said in an interview, “but early indications are definitely difficult. If you’re a Copper River fisherman or a Kodiak fisherman, it’s not reassuring to hear that overall it’s too early.”
June 29, 2018 –Jellyfish have been a natural part of the Bering Sea ecosystem for decades, but in recent years, their population numbers in the region have dramatically increased. Now, a research team funded by the National Science Foundation is in Nome to find out what the cause and implications might be.
“There are certainly fish that do feed on jellyfish: some of the salmon do, some other fish. But in this part of the world, not this many fish feed on jellyfish.”
That’s Mary Beth Decker, a research scientist from Yale University who is part of a three-person research team sailing to Slime Bank in the southern Bering Sea this week, north of the Alaska Peninsula. As she noted, there are minimal benefits from having jellyfish around. Not only do few types of fish eat them, but these species aren’t exactly edible for humans, either.
When it comes to potential consequences of having more jellyfish, though, Decker says that’s a different story.
“And we know that they have impacts on the ecosystem, because they feed on things that fish eat. For example, they’ll eat small crustaceans, zoo plankton, that are prey for other seabirds and marine mammals. And also fish, both young fish and some older fish, like herring, as well.”
According to Decker, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has been recording jellyfish numbers in the Bering Sea for the last 40 years using their trawls. The populations have fluctuated up and down throughout that period for multiple species of jellies, including larger ones like Pacific Sea Nettle, but Decker also points out there are smaller types that are harder to see or even catch in trawl nets.
That’s why Joanna Chierici, a teacher from New Jersey, is onboard this research voyage, to educate and reach out to groups about the types and numbers of jellyfish present in the Bering Sea.
June 28, 2018 — In a sweeping memo released today, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt asked the agency to propose changes to how it uses the Clean Water Act.
In the memo, Pruitt wrote that the action would fit in with his larger aim to “ensure predictability and regulatory certainty and take actions based upon a comprehensive understanding of the facts.”
The proposal would eliminate EPA’s ability to preemptively or retroactively veto permits for waste discharge in waterways, restricting the agency’s ability to step in and regulate large projects. However, the proposal is far from final.
Under the Obama administration, EPA used its authority under Section 404(c) of the Clean Water Act to propose restrictions on the Pebble Mine before the developer applied for a permit with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
That essentially halted the controversial project until last year, when EPA reached a settlement with Pebble under the Trump administration. Then in January, Pruitt suspended the agency’s move to reconsider the Obama-era proposal, saying Pebble may pose an “unacceptable” risk to Bristol Bay, home to one of the most valuable salmon fisheries in the world.